Luck is simply a word we use to describe events beyond our control. When they turn out more favourably than we expected we call it "good luck" and when they turn out less favourably we call it "bad luck". It is possible to increase your chances of favourable outcomes by good preparation and by seeking out as many opportunities as possible. But some people will experience a run of particularly good or bad outcomes through sheer chance, and they will be described as "lucky" or "unlucky" even though they didn't really do anything to cause it. Of course, some people manage to turn their lives into an endless series of unfortunate events due to their own bad decisions, and they are usually only too keen to blame it on "bad luck".

That's not quite it. He is saying that "luck" is not an outside force that visits some happily and others malevolently, but instead is an inside force that tends to be positive or negative depending on our own outlook and approach to life.

My whole life acquaintances have remarked to me about how "lucky" I am, because, for the most part, my life has been pretty good. Not great, but good. My response is that what they attribute to "good luck" is rather the results of choices that my parents made, and that I made based on my parents' example and teaching, plus a little planning for possible bad chance events. My conclusion is that nearly all of what people call "bad luck" is rather the (usually foreseeable) consequences of bad choices. And over the years, my sympathy for people who consistently make bad choices has gotten very close to nil.

I think it is all about viewpoint. There are those that understand that how they feel about something is a product of their thoughts. They understand that they control their thoughts, and choose which thoughts to pay attention to, and which to ignore. With time and practice this will change the origin of their initial thoughts to positive or negative thoughts from the get-go. This reinforcement of one view or the other is in their control, and reinforcing one set of thoughts drives out the other. As Lincoln said, "Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be." The fellow that broke his leg falling down the stairs and felt lucky he didn't break his neck is an example.

But wait, there's more. Knowing what to place attention on is also critical to this. Knowing the difference between what you can change and what you can not change, and then focusing on the things you can change is just as crucial. Knowing you can not change the past for instance (falling down the stairs), and therefore not dwelling on it - and knowing what you can change in the future and doing something to effect positive change (fixing the stairs) is a fundamental practice. The AA prayer is one of the best bits of wisdom in the universe.

Luck is real, good and bad luck both. Random events do happen to us. However the approach to how to deal with those events isn't random at all. It is simply a matter of choice and practice.

Why would anyone want to become lucky? That's bizarre. In the first place, you're going to be a lot more satisfied with your life and its accomplishments if you feel almost none of the positive is due to good luck -- but rather to your own good character, skills, and effort. Who would want to win a Nobel Prize or the Superbowl, and then feel well...that was just the most amazing luck, huh? 'Cause I sure don't have the brains or skill to get here on my own... Yuck.

And in the second place, the nasty thing about luck is it's wholly out of your control -- who'd want to feel wholly out of control of the big important things that happen to you? Who'd want to have no idea whether the future would continue to be good or not, depending on how your luck waxed and waned?

Foo. I'd hate to feel lucky. When good stuff happens to me I like to feel I earned it, and when bad stuff happens I like to feel there's something I could've done to ward it off (and will do next time). Feeling lucky is a creepy scary feeling.

If you are a fan of wishful thinking, and you never probed into the fact that hope and change in the face of the greatest economic challenge in 80 years is a poor substitute for an actual economic plan, which Sen. Obama never provided in 2008. Then in the following years the phrase "unexpectedly" will usually be the first word in every financial article from the New York Times and "Bad Luck" will be the last two words. What happens in between are several paragraphs of hand wringing the little people just wouldn't understand.

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